(English intro to Spanish lang post) While many reporters are rewriting about the 10 most important scientific discoveries of 2011 according to Science, a Cuban science reporter has done a very good job reviewing the most important scientific achievements of Cuban local researchers.

Science journalism in Cuba has a character all its own. First, science is different there. At least, some motivations are distinctive. Cuban researchers are not crazy to publish in high impact-factor magazines. They put higher the benefits of their research for the population. The lead of the story we mentioned is “…results of Cuban science which application has impacted more positively in economy, society and environment”. Examples include water sanitation, new materials for construction, improvements in farming, genetic characterization of cattle, hydroelectric engineering, and new herbicides. For example, in a separate story we read that 98% of fertilizers and other products on Cuban farms are produced in the country.  

There  are reasons to see Cuban science skeptically. The fact that Cuban science is not peer reviewed and the absence of a free press force us to be cautious. For instance, another story explains that more than 2000 Cubans have been already treated with the first therapeutic vaccine against lung cancer. It’s called CIMAVax-EGF, and local researchers claim they’ve proved its efficacy and safety. They are not talking about a clinical trial, but actual treatment. That sounds weird. And we don’t see any reporter asking tough questions about it.

Another aspect to point out is that, free press or not, a good amount of science stories is in such daily newspapers as Juventud Rebelde. They also are well-written. In the paper’s science section are names of at least 5 different reporters. Unlike the typical newspaper in Latin America, the majority of stories are about local science. The most important international science news is covered too. And also, they publish original investigations and reviews, including a great story about the historical relationship between surgeons and barbers. We’d need to explore more in depth the characteristics of science journalism in Cuba, but we dare to say that it could be a good reference for some countries in the region. 

Cuba es muy peculiar en lo que respecta a información científica. Por muchos motivos. Primero por el elevado número de notas de ciencia que publican sus medios, y el nivelón que demuestran sus periodistas. No comentamos tan a menudo porque desde fuera nos desconcierta un poco, y porque tienen una selección muy peculiar de noticias. Pero frecuentemente leemos textos excelentes, escritos con una prosa magnífica. Esta selección peculiar es el otro motivo de interés: Cuba podría ser el país donde los medios más atención pongan a la ciencia local. Es lo que reclamamos para muchos lugares, donde las páginas científicas a menudo se llenan de estudios intrascendentes bien publicitados por gabinetes y agencias. Cuba es diferente. No sólo por lo que respecta al periodismo (y aquí no estoy hablando de control gubernamental sino de puros contenidos), sino por las características de esta ciencia local. Decimos esto con muchas precauciones: su modelo podría ser un ejemplo para muchos países de la región.

A lo que nos referimos es que los investigadores cubanos (en base a lo que leemos en los medios) no parecen estar tan interesados en publicar en Science o Nature. La ciencia cubana es diferente; está dirigida directamente a mejorar las condiciones de vida de su población. Fijémonos en una frase de la entradita del artículo publicado en Juventud Rebelde por Marianela Martín González “Cuando la ciencia mira al país”, acerca de (y esta es la frase) “los resultados de la ciencia cubana cuya aplicación ha repercutido en el 2011 de manera positiva en la economía, la sociedad y el medio ambiente”.

¡Qué diantre ir haciendo refritos de los 10 descubrimientos científicos más importantes del año según Science! Sí; está bien hacerlo, pero Cuba es el único país donde un periodista se ha esforzado en destacar los resultados de científicos locales cuyas aplicaciones más han aportado al país. Destaquemos la palabra “aplicaciones”. Bravo por esta vocación. ¿De qué avances científicos estamos hablando? Ecomateriales para viviendas que han ganado premio de la UNESCO, mejoras en la alimentación y crianza de puercos, desarrollo de productos fitosanitarios, ingeniería hidráulica, detección de contaminantes, gestión de calidad de industria biotecnológica, vacunas para asma, caracterización genética de ganado bovino, detección de virus en ganadería… y estudios de carácter social como incidencia de cáncer, papel de medios de comunicación, análisis poblacionales, etc. Por poner un ejemplo concreto, leemos otro artículo de Marianela Martín G: “Cuba produce casi todos sus medicamentos veterinarios”. El 98% de las vacunas virales, tratamientos contra bacterias u alimentos probióticos son producidos en el país. Muy revelador.

El otro foco de interés en el análisi del periodismo científico es la desconfianza que inevitablemente nos genera el país. Por varios motivos: poca independencia de los medios, dudas de que siendo un país tan pobre puedan desarrollar ciencia de tanto nivel como a veces insinúan, y la falta de “peer review” en la ciencia cubana. Esto nos intranquiliza. Estamos acostumbrados a que cuando Journal of Neuroscience publica un artículo, investigadores independientes lo han revisado y dado el visto bueno. En Cuba, desde fuera, vamos perdidos. No sabemos si están vendiendo humo o no. Un ejemplo clarísimo es la nota también en Juventud Rebelde “Más de 2000 cubanos han recibido vacuna terapéutica contra cáncer de pulmón”. Ostras! Es esto un fármaco novedoso que deberíamos empezar a retwittear por todo el mundo, o una irresponsabilidad. Si nos pidieran escoger entre los dos extremos, nos iríamos más bien al segundo. ¿Cómo puede Cuba tener la primera vacuna terapéutica contra el cáncer???? Ojo; la nota no dice que sea parte de un estudio clínico, sino que es una vacuna que ya se está aplicando tras demostrar inocuidad y elevar la esperanza y calidad de vida de los enfermos. Y según los científicos cubanos, pronto habrá una versión de CIMAVax-EGF para cáncer de próstata. Buscando en Pubmed, vemos que sí hay un par de papers publicados por investigadores cubanos, pero nos suena muy fuerte que Cuba haya aprobado la primera vacuna terapéutica contra el cáncer. Lo reconocemos, hay perjuicios: si nos dijeran que viene de la Johns Hopkins y publicado en el NEJM nos lo creeríamos. A lo que nos referimos es que aplaudimos la voluntad de sacar a relucir la ciencia local, felicitamos el excelente trabajo de los reporteros de ciencia que a menudo leemos, pero dudamos del espíritu crítico que tengan o les permitan tener.

Otro aspecto a destacar: los extensos y trabajados textos que los periodistas realizan. Es algo que parece en extinción en otros medios diarios, pero el la homepage de Juventud Revelde podemos encontrar hoy mismo un gran reportaje de Amaruy E. Del Valle “Un 2011 agitado en el ciberespacio”, un pedazo artículo de Julio César Hernández sobre la relación histórica entre barberos y cirujanos, y el artículo de Mileyda Menéndez Dávila “Del desconcierto al placer”, sobre la eyaculación femenina.

En definitiva: muy interesante explorar más y mejor el modelo de desarrollo científico en Cuba, y el trabajo de los periodistas científicos. Destacar como ejemplo, que en la portada online de Juventud Rebelde sólo hay 7 categorías: Cuba-Internacional-Opinión-Cultura-Ciencia y Tecnología-Deportes-Comunas. Ojalá este modelo fuera más frecuente.

- Pere Estupinyà

For about nine years two tag-team satellites, collectively called the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment or GRACE, have zipped around Earth in formation. Their course deviations reveal precisely the varying concentration of mass in the Earth, allowing mapping of its interior by density. Its focus is on things that change over time. Grace, a joint NASA and German project, will get two little sisters with about the same job to do but  at the Moon even if not much changes there. The first gets there on New Year’s eve and the second January 1. Collectively the are GRAIL, for Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory. They have been on separate but similar long, roundabout, and energy-saving marches almost any way but moonward, feinting first toward the Sun and past gravity-kink Libration Point 1 since their launch Sept. 10 from Cape Canaveral.

   Several outlets have advance stories, or curtain raisers, out on the scheduled operating deployment of the GRAIL birds. It’s mildly peculiar that none that came into view allude to GRACE, an obvious relative of the new program. The missions share several top scientists. GRACE affords a convenient avenue for explaining that this sort of research comes naturally to planetary geophysicists. One might dig up a few GRACE examples to show how powerful the method is. GRACE already has, for instance, measured the displacement of mass in Earth’s crust by large earthquakes and the deflection of the surface by the weight of floods in Bangladesh. Now it’ll chart the Moon’s mass deviations to similar or better accuracy. Perhaps the oversight has easy explanation, if not excuse: a press release from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab does not make the association either.

Stories:

• AP – Alicia Chang: NASA probes to arrive at the moon over New Year’s ;
• Space.com – Mike Wall: NASA’s twin moon probes to enter orbit this weekend ; Nice description (if not ‘graceful’) of the ambition to get these things down to where they’re nearly buzzing the craters’ rims.
• NPR – Eyder Peralta: Twin NASA Probes Will Arrive At The Moon By New Year’s ; Not much – rewrite with citations of other outlets, presumably of the handout too.
• AFP: Twin NASA probes approach lunar orbit ;
• Register (UK) Lewis Page: NASA to place twin proes in Moon orbit as you snog beneath mistletoe ; Catchy hed but not much else – except for noting that these craft keep such close watch on one another that they can tell when their separation has changed by as little as a micron or, as Page writes, the diameter or a red blood cell.
• Universe Today – Ken Kremer: NASA’s Unprecedented Science Twins are GO to Orbit our Moon on New Year’s Eve ; Unprecedented to the moon, maybe, but what about GRACE?!
• Orange County Register – Pat Brennan: Twin moon probes to make New Year’s arrival ;
• Denver Post – Ann Schrader: Lockheed-built twin Grail spacecraft eneter orbit around moon this weekend ;

Just to show that the GRAIL-GRACE Nexus is not obscure, some digging reveals this that ran just prior to mission launch:

• Aviation Week (Sept 8, 2011) Frank Morring Jr. : NASA Readies Twin Lunar Spacecraft; Anybody planning on covering the onset of science operations might, even before reading the press kit  stem to stern, read this savvy account.

Grist for the Mill: NASA-JPL GRAIL mission ; NASA Press Release ; NASA Press Kit ;

- Charlie Petit

Stories:

Here’s a well-framed shot of the night sky from high above the Atacama Desert in Chile as 2011 nears its end. I choose to take it as an omen of hope and optimism. New Scientist picked it up from the European Southern Observatory. Lensman Guillaume Blanchard caught the scene as little and thoroughly roasted Comet Lovejoy (see earlier post) preceded the dawn sun into the sky, the Milky Way high above (looks like a Magellanic Cloud on the right?), and a unit of the Very Large Telescope hunkers in the foreground. I amped this small version with the auto-correct. Its subtle majesty is better, on larger format, when viewed as it was published. Here is that in hi def. Follow the link to see more images that New Scientist provides, including a video of the comet shot from the International Space Station, and another time-lapse loop, featuring the comet and the telescope’s red laser adaptive optics beam, during dawn at ESO’s Cerro Paranal.

Grist for the Mill: ESO Press Release ;

- Charlie Petit

Earlier this month, as reported in this post, enterprising reporting at the American Geophysical Union meeting by the UK’s and Independent’s Steve Connor broke news of large burbling expanses off the Siberian coast. Methane gas released from the seabed, reported a Russian team (based in part at the University of Alaska’s Int’l Arctic Research Center in Fairbanks), has increased atmospheric concentration of the gas dramatically in some regions. The news spread in headlines around the world. Connor had the basics – there is a lot of it and is has not previously been accounted for in greenhouse gas ledgers.

The news however deserved further digging, particularly to explain where the methane is coming from and the role of climate change in kicking it loose – thus posing a possibility that expected, further warming will ramp the emissions of this potent greenhouse gas higher yet.

The Independent’s story took a rather lathered stance, raising the spectre of drastic and dire consequences of these zones of bubblin’ CH4. Few other outlets bothered to check whether the alarm is justified.

The most diligent, and somewhat reassuring, response has come in two installments from New York Times ex-reporter, now-blogger who is labeled as an opinion writer by the Times but is a reporter still, Andrew C. Revkin at his influential DotEarth site.

• Dec. 14: Methane Time Bomb in Arctic Seas – Apocalypse Not ; Revkin reports that while the phenomenon may be worrisome, the results and pertinent, related papers make pretty clear that whatever is going on, don’t blame recent global warming. The process is a long-echo of the end of the ice age and the rise of the ocean across a former, permafrost and tundra landscape. He could not reach the AGU presentation (a poster) authors, but quoted liberally. He wrote, aiming his comment at both readers and other reporters, “So next time you see a science stunner about Arctic methane time bombs, reach out to a couple of scientists working on this gas before you run to the ramparts.” As a willing rampart runner, I take that to heart.
• Dec. 27: Leaders of Arctic Methane Project Clarify Climate Concerns ; After reaching the lead researcher in the Russian work, Revkin gets first-hand assurance that whatever some news reports may have said, the proposed reason for the methane release is not recent warming, but inundation of the former dry and frozen land, now the bed of a shallow offshore zone, by seawater. That, and discovery that such submerged permafrost may melt at a somewhat colder temperture than has been assumed, explains the high methane release now underway.

This still seems like half-reported news. It has yet to be well-dissected by anyone in widely-circulated media. Revkin made his stab, but a few more reporters ought to fill remaining holes. What exactly is believed to be happening down there?  Is the methane already methane, or is it being produced as organic material decomposes due to microbial action. Is it methane clathrates (also called hydrates) that are melting and disassociating? Both? And whether or not the region’s warming is releasing this subsea methane (compounding warming’s acceleration of methane production on Arctic land), what kind of impact might it have on the future pace of warming? Just because something is natural not feedback withmankind’s fingerprint on it does not mean it is trivial. If there’s a debate underway among scientists on the answers, so much the better as news and it merits reporting. And if there is an expert consensus, that would demand reporting as well. But somebody ought to resolve to make make the calls some time soon and find out – and then write an engaging, maybe disturbing or maybe reassuring, news feature that gives readers something to hang on to.

*UPDATE: Yesterday afternoon Revkin added another long entry at Dot Earth on Arctic methane worries. It summarizes and extracts passages from emails he received from Arctic climate experts, plus a documentary video maker, he queried for their reaction to recent, speculative news on methane releases from the shallow continental shelf off Siberia. Most tend to say that while important, the methane releases seem unlikely to push Earth close to any sort of runaway tipping point. Few indicate much certainty in that conclusion, however, and all call for increased study of the issue. An outlier is the documentary maker, who says he is stunned by any effort to minimize the risk (different from likelihood) of a non-linear climate catastrophe just from Arctic methane.

- Charlie Petit

Honestly, and while fighting off the blahs of too many rich foods and leftovers, your tracker looked around for something newsy this morning, beyond a rather good NYTimes ScienceTimes.

Hope grew on seeing that, a week ago, Monsanto got permission from the US Dept. of Agriculture’s  Animal and Planet Health Inspection Service to plant corn modified for better drought tolerance. Here’s a small Reuters item by Charles Abbott. That’s interesting, one thought, a transgenic crop with a trait other than built-in BT pesticide, or tolerance for herbicide. Which is to say, a socially useful trait that may increase yields without, in the process, making farmers even more dependent on agrobusiness chemicals and other products. Perhaps, one thought, somebody might make note of this hint of the substantial benefits once promised for agriculture in the age of recombinant DNA.

Nothing substantial yet, however. I’ll keep eyes open for something along those lines. A specialty outlet called Agri-Pulse did look a bit further, mentioning other modified crops Monsanto is working on. One is a soybean with an unnatural ability to include an extra, medicinal fatty acid, and another is for a soybean that has – same old same old – a tolerance for certain herbicides called fops.

*UPDATE: We rec’d from the following author, thank you very much, a link toward more news info on Monsanto’s and its competitors’ corn and drought strategies, and reasons regulators are paying attention.

• Scientific American (May 13, 2011)  David Biello : Coming to a Cornfield Near You: Genetically Induced Drought-Resistance ;

Emboldened, your tracker looked further afield for genetic modification news. And found a whiff of a science news mega-twofer, a GM dinosaur story.

  It is at LiveScience from Stephanie Pappas: Dino-Chicken: Wacky but Serious Science Idea of 2011. It updates news about Jack Horner and his gang of  paleontological science wits and their continuing work on a scheme – much reported over the last two years or so – to reset the skeletal genomes of standard chickens back to ancestral levels by more than 100 million years. The result could be an outward echo of their theropod ancestors. Forelimbs instead of wings, long tail rather than a feathered stub, and maybe throw in a few teeth.

Chickens are the starting points, as their genes are well-charted, but one can imagine that if the key changes in gene promoters and alleles were found in chickens – bear with me as we all suspend disbelief together – a natural and vaguely wicked next step would be to try it in something serious, as in an ostrich or emu. Then we’d have a STORY – a beasty that could really turn the tables on the next fox to wander into Horner’s chicken coop, and if let loose from his hometown of Bozeman might got folks up there to forget all about their supposed wolf problem.

Pappas dates this story today, the 27th, so presumably the Q&A she has with Horner was done recently. Or perhaps this is a re-tread. Glad it came along. We all need something light this time of year. Horner tells her that a lot of the basic reversions have been witnessed in lab animals, so putting them together is not hard to imagine. He makes a nice point. That if one revives a dinosaur from one of today’s dino-avians, which is to say revives primitive, ancestral characteristics, that implies chickens do have ancestry going back to such creatures. Evolution QED, you pesky creationists!

Horner actually comes off sounding rather sensible about this project. No Emu-born velociraptor II for him, or a T. Rex Redux. He says, “Sixth graders would do that, but’d I’d just as soon make something that wouldn’t eat me.” As for the chicken project, he says, they’ll still think they’re chickens.

UPDATE 2 : Turns out this hit on chicken-o-saurus, during a search for GM stories, merely landed me on an  entry in LiveScience’s year-ending lists of stories, category Wacky Animal Stories. It is now included in a subsequent tracker post on such lists. Unclear is whether this ran earlier this year too, or has been done expressly for the end-of-year salutes.

- Charlie Petit

(English intro to Spanish lang post) The new government in Spain has eliminated the Ministry of Science, and transferred  responsibility for scientific research to the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness. Initially, the scientific community reacted in fury in blogposts and such avenues as social media. Fear were high that the new government of Mariano Rajoy is just not interested in science or related basic research. The first stories in newspapers reflected these views. But other opinions, little by little, have showed up. Some say that having a specific ministry is irrelevant. Others see the decision as an opportunity to put science in closer connection to economic growth. However,  few reporters have done a good job taking all views into account.

Revuelo y debate en la comunidad de investigadores españoles por la desaparición del Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, dirigido desde 2008 por Cristina Garmendia. Tras las elecciones y con el cambio de gobierno, el presidente Mariano Rajoy ha decidido que la ciencia española quede adscrita a una secretaría de estado dependiente del Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad. Esto ha generado dos reacciones. En la primera, blogs y redes sociales se llenaron de protestas de investigadores declarándose indignados por lo que consideran un menosprecio a la ciencia, y un signo de que el actual gobierno no tiene interés alguno en la investigación. En la segunda, varias voces reaccionaron diciendo que el problema de la ciencia en España es más profundo, y que no depende de si existe un ministerio o no, sino de las decisiones que se tomen. Veamos algunas reacciones. Empecemos por los científicos, a quienes los medios han ofrecido espacios.

El Mundo publica un texto de la portavoz de la plataforma Investigación Digna e investigadora del Centro de Astrobiología, Amaya Moro-Martín “Ciencia en España: ¿misión imposible?”. Amaya representa quizás la visión más crítica con la eliminación del ministerio. Para Amaya, “Es surrealista que algo tan abstracto como `competitividad´ haya sustituido a algo tan concreto como la investigación científica.”. Quizás que  la palabra “competitividad” sea abstracta para los investigadores es parte del problema de la ciencia española. Amaya compara con Europa, donde los países más avanzados sí gestionan su ciencia desde un ministerio, y opina que la ausencia de un ministerio especializado impedirá el cambio de modelo productivo tan anhelado por todo el mundo.

Éste es el punto más contradictorio de los investigadores españoles y sus repetitivas defensas de la ciencia básica: se llenan la boca diciendo que sin ciencia básica no hay innovación, ni aplicaciones, ni riqueza. Pero nunca se atreven a afrontar que el cuello de botella en España no se encuentra tanto en la falta de apoyo a la ciencia básica (la única que parece sepan hacer los investigadores e instituciones españolas), sino en la pobre transferencia de este conocimiento que se logra. El artículo en El País de Carolina García “La biotecnología española apenas logra patentes” pone el dedo en la llaga: España aporta el 9% de publicaciones científicas en revistas de alto impacto, pero sólo el 1.5% de las patentes de la UE. Aquí hay un obvio desequilibrio a abordar. Para conseguir el tan ansiado cambio de modelo productivo es fundamental continuar apoyando la investigación básica, pero prioritario solucionar este problema. Que tú publiques y otro patente sí es surrealista. “Continuamos siendo incapaces de transformar el conocimiento”, dice el artículo. Y esto parece que no lo quieran ver algunos científicos. También en El País, el presidente de la sociedad española de neurociencia Juan Lerma escribe “Mejor un ministerio de Ciencia y Economía”. Allí afirma que “la ciencia está antes que la economía y es de ella de la que brota la competitividad. Sin ciencia no hay competitividad; sin ciencia no hay progreso”. Bonito, pero incorrcto. E ingenuo. Lerma reclama que es mejor “hacer más economía con ciencia en vez de economizar la ciencia”. Suena perfecto. Pero históricamente las Universidades e instituciones científicas españolas no han sabido demostrar que sean capaces. Algo de autocrítica no iría mal. No se ve disparatado que los gobernantes decidan por la vía de economizar la ciencia, y quizás dar un nuevo rumbo a la i+D+i en España. La anterior ministra ya trabajaba en esta dirección, recibiendo críticas de los predicadores de la investigación básica. De hecho, según la exministra lo importante no es que la ciencia tenga un ministerio, sino que “Garmendia cree que lo importante es que la Ciencia tenga un espacio económico” (EFE) y “que impacten en la competitividad de la economía”. Resulta obvio que ideas y políticas están por encima de si existe un ministerio o no.

Esta es la posición que poco a poco empezó a aparecer tras las iniciales muestras de indignación de científicos. De hecho, según Europa Press “los científicos apoyan el paso de Ciencia a Economía“. Mal título porque de ninguna manera este es el pensamiento mayoritario, pero para el presidente de la COSCE la decisión “es un reconocimiento de que se quiere trabajar en que un modelo económico para el futuro basado en el conocimiento, la investigación y el desarrollo”. Suena iluso también, pero precavido cuando solicita al gobierno que no se disgreguen las competencias y haya una buena coordinación. Desde luego, qué patético titular para una nota explicando que para la Federación de Jóvenes Investigadores “la noticia confirma sus peores presagios”.

Entre los periodistas que cubren de manera habitual notas de ciencia, el mejor texto con gran diferencia ha sido el de Alicia Rivera “¿Debe haber un ministerio de Ciencia?” en El País. Otros como “La ciencia barrida en el nuevo ministerio de Rajoy” (Miguel Corral – El Mundo) o “El secretario de estado de I+D tendrá que actuar como ministro de facto” (Nuño Domínguez – Público) hacen un buen trabajo pero se quedan sólo en la preocupación inicial y espontánea (y quizás superficial) por la desaparición del ministerio. El artículo de Alicia cuenta con las fuentes principales, desde los científicos que ven la decisión de depender de economía como una oportunidad (sin obviar el miedo a que dentro de un ministerio tan grande quede relegada a algo secundario), a los que critican la decisión por la amenaza a la ciencia básica que supone y porque la separa de educación (de nuevo; quizás a nivel de ministerio pero falta ver qué ocurre en la práctica), y los que la ven irrelevante y se preocupan por construir de una vez una Agencia Estatal de Investigación. Mejor esto que un ministerio.

- Pere Estupinyà

There were two or three frissons this morning reading the ScienceTimes on the Kindle Touch I just got thank you very much dear daughters (I am unsure whether or how I can get the NYT subscription free as an old-school home delivery customer, as one can with i-phone etc. apps, but am investigating…). These were frissons not of the deja vu sort, but of revelation of the non mystical, non-epiphanic kind.

First up, and well inside (learned by checking the dead tree version) is Nicholas Bakolar‘s Vital Statistics story on a recent event – US poisonings have overtaken car accidents as a cause of death. Really? Rat poison, arsenic, strychnine, Socrates’s hemlock, that horrid ricin stuff, heavy metal pollution, what? Those are the sorts of things that mean poison to most. Drug overdoses, prescription and illicit, seem intuitively to be a different category logical. But that’s mainly what’s up on the Morbidity and Mortality stats : overdoses. The crossover in the lethality stakes, one must add, is also due to the steady decline in auto fatalities. Anyway – perhaps a broader appreciation of drugs as poisons, a label more usually affixed to anticancer chemotherapy agents but not much else medicinal, is a good thing.

A larger head-snap came on reading the sparkling lead story on a-DREN-ar-kee, properly spelled adrenarche, the hormonal accompaniment in children roughly starting at kindergarten age that turns them into semi-rational sub-adults whose brains suddenly begin adding subtlety of thought, foresight, empathy, impulse-control, and other signals they really are growing up. Not having noticed who wrote it I came across a novel term for the end of adrenarche, when adolescence kicks in and hormones amp up even further. The story calls that new phase “a gonadal reveille.” Yikes, who wrote THAT I wondered, but with a strong sense of suspicion. It’s a feature story, not a column but in nearly conventional news story style, from distinctive wordsmith Natalie Angier. Of course. The piece also comes with an enterprising collection by Times book review editor Gregory Cowles of literary passages on children who have reached,  to quote another Angierism, “chapter-book age.” I do not recall, from when I was growing up, hearing that term. But the 21st century grandchildren all boast about it, in signalling a rite of passage, when they start reading chapter books.

Other notable headlines, and this week’s edition has many:

• Henry Fountain : Graceful Moves, for a Boy Made of Metal: Superb yarn on the mechanical dolls, toys, and commercial boastings by Swiss watchmakers of centuries back and who once competed to build mechanical pets and people of remarkable dexterity. Such clockwork contrivances leave contemporary mechanics awed by their precision and cleverness. It might have made reference to a personal favorite, L. Frank Baum’s Tik-Tok of Oz. As a kid during adrenarche, that spherical fellow utterly transfixed my imagination.
• Sindya N. Bhanoo : Tiniest of Spiders Are Loaded With Brains;  I dunno how many science writers follow the journal Arthropod Structure and Development, but somehow Ms. Bhanoo found a goodie that provides the biggest surprise on a topic I’d never ever had thought to wonder about. Which is, how high can brains as percent of body mass go? In spiders, ridiculously high (Amendment to my how-this-arose remark. Just found a Smithsonian press release.)
• William J. Broad: Science and Censorship: A Duel Lasting Centuries ; A piece that puts a historic frame around a page 1 update by Denise Grady and Donald G. McNeil Jr., on efforts to restrict publication of anything resembling a recipe for terrorism or other mischief resulting from discovery of how to alter H5N1 virus into a contagion easily transmissable among people by airborne droplets.
• Laurie Tarkan – New Drugs Raise Hope For Patients With M.S. – A model of efficient clinical medical writing, full of insight and mentions of new results and appropriate caveats.
• Karen Barrow – Have We Met? Tracing Face Blindness to its Roots; Seems that we’ve read a lot on this odd mental handicap, and I feared it’d be a rehash. But has new info linking it to a condition associated with a different sense.
• Jane E. Brody: Sodium-Saturated Diet Is a Threat for All ; Brody does not quite say it explicitly, but this is a clarion for a new round of what some will call nanny regulations. Brody has the influence to get it started. She makes the case that somebody ought to lay down the law on processed food makers and restaurant chefs who amp their products’ taste with heapings of salt. Maybe salt ought, in the spirit of Bakalar’s story on poisons, be put in a harsher category. This is a well-filled-out feature born of breaking news past. The general topic was in news six months ago (see version by Julie Steenhuysen at Reuters).

As ever, lots more. Whole Section.

- Charlie Petit

While a few outlets surely will tell kiddies over the weekend that air traffic controllers are clearing the way for Santa Claus and his reindeer, another set of flying objects will be getting a good deal more, serious attention: Warblers, wrens, finches, sparrows, hawks, owls, partridges in pear trees or not, leggy avocets, birds of all kinds, with volunteers sending their sighting data to the National Audubon Society for its 112th Christmas Bird Count.

The holiday season needs a science news salute. I thought first there might be something on Christmas trees to write, maybe pines or cedar or something else is closing in on the ever-favored fir and spruce trees. Or perhaps the nutrition overload of the season. This is better. Audubon is among the world’s oldest natural science societies. It has an unusually deep penetration into the general population. It diligently helps to keep an eye on the population dynamics of the feathered dinosaurs among us. If historic inertia can be overcome it ought to change the name of this one from Christmas to holiday or Year-end bird count, just to get more of us nothings, pagans, and all sorts of non-Christians  happily signed up. But still, it’s a grand tradition. So here goes:

• Miami Herald – David Yarnold: Audubon’s Christmas bird count: Doing crowd-science since 1900 ; This one has the broad view, noting that this is a global event lasting December 14 to January 5.  Yarnold provides history, examples of merit (such as documentation of species migration with changing climate), and he did some work for me: His Google of “Christmas Bird Count” yielded 700,000 web links. I can’t track’em all, but has some more media examples.
• Lafourche Parish (LA) Daily Comet – Nikki Buskey: Christmas count turns birdwatchers into scientists ; Already on the local ledger: the green-tailed towhee and the Say’s phoebe.
• Fairbanks News Miner (AL) Tim Mowry: Odd Duck: Ring-necked pheasant is biggest surprise of Christman Bird Count ;
• Houston Chronicle – Flori Meeks: Birders get set for annual count; More than 100 species expected in just one local tally.
• Great Falls Tribune (MT) Michael Babcock: Christmas Bird Count: More species, more counters this year ;
• Baxter Bulletin (Ark) Joanne Bratton: Birdwatchers spot thousands during count
• Aspinwall Herald (PA) Mary Ann Thomas : Birders seek common, rare species in Alle-Kiski Valley woodlands ; Thomas got some space here, and filled it. The Pittsburgh region, one learns, has a lot of hairy woodpeckers.
• Moncton Times & Transcript (New Brunswick) Shannon MacLeod: N.B. birders flock to Fundy for annual count ;
• Cleveland Plain Dealer – James F. McCarty: Christmas Bird Counts yield plenty of nice species – and a few surprises along the way ; A columnist describes his day, binoculars in hand.

There are many more. This is a legit science event. In all the years doing the Knight tracker, I’d bet no other news has sparked as many tories from small local newspapers, as a percentage of the total, as this one did.

Grist for the Mill:

Audubon Bird Count Volunteer Page ; Audubon general Press Release , and NYC’s Central Park results Press Release ;

- Charlie Petit

At the American Inst. of Physics’s Inside Science News Service managing editor Ben P. Stein updates an oldie but goody for the holidays: The levitating slinky.  Late science writer Martin Gardner, former math puzzle editor at Scientific American and a leader of science skepticism of astrologers, spoon benders, and other huckster first wrote about the phenomenon, Stein notes, ten years ago or so.

One can see the trick with the naked eye, but a slo-mo replay helps. Hold one end of the slinky at arm’s length, letting the rest dangle straght down. Wait for it to stop significant movement. Drop it. Watch the bottom. It does not move. While the top plummets toward the floor, the last coil down stays put until all the coils collapse together, after which the whole toy takes off toward the Earth’s core.

It’s not that the phenomenon defies explanation, for after seeing it the mind realizes there are all sort of changing force magnitudes in the slinky once it is realeased, chiefly the tension of a spring acting in a direction opposite gravity. But perfect, initial  nothing at the bottom? Intuition is not prepared to see the bottom just hang there for a few fractions of a second. And would you ever stop to think, as Stein assures is the case and for which he provides links to the argument for it, that the hover time of the Slinky’s bottom would be indifferent to how strong a gravity field it is in? On Pluto on Mars as on the Earth? Maybe experienced physicists, ones who teach statics and dynamics or use it in their everyday research, say “of course” immediately. To most of us, it’s weird.

Sometimes serious news comes along with a nagging distraction that puts a hitch in effort to take it soberly at face value. So here it is: Science’s editors today revealed they have withdrawn a 2009 paper on detection of a retrovirus in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome. One of the authors: Vince Lombardi. Actually one does not know his nickname, but the name is Vincent C. Lombardi. Either way one has difficulty not, briefly, smirking over the late-coach Lombardi’s little-known involvement in biomedical studies.

Doubts about the paper have circulated almost since it was published. Those who follow medical news closely, especially the grassroots patients advocacy wing, know about the background. In a statement over the name of editor-in-chief Bruce Alberts, the journal says it has “lost confidence” in the original report due to poor quality control in key aspects of the reported research, and failure of other groups to replicate the finding of elevated xenotropic murine leukemia virus in people with the condition.

The paper ran in October, 2009, with Lombardi the lead author in a group at the Whittemore Peters Institute in Reno, Nevada.

Some outlets already have stories up. Several note that the affair is not simple. Retraction by the journal came despite objection by some of the authors. The events leading up to it have already had surprising consequences, including the arrest of one author, since fired by the institute, who refused to sign the retraction and is being sued by her former employer for alleged coverup of data:

• AP – Malcolm Ritter: Study linking virus and chronic fatigue retracted ;
  
• Medpage Today – John Gever: Journal Retracts Paper Linking Mouse Virus to CFS;
• Wall St. Journal – Katherine Hobson: Science Retracts Paper on XMRV-Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Link
• Bloomberg-Business Week – Elizabeth Lopatto: Science Journal Retracts Paper Linking Fatigue and Virus ;
• ScienceInsider – Jon Cohen: In a Rare Move, Science Without Authors’ Consent Retracts Paper That Ties Mouse Virus to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ; Also see, Civil Court Rules Against Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Researcher ;
• Ars Technica – John Timmer: Paper linking XMRV to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome finally retracted ;

The events public history was recounted in Science in September by  Cohen and Martin Enserink;

- Charlie Petit

(English intro to Spanish lang post) Jacinto Convit is one of the most esteemed scientists in Venezuela. At 98 years old, he is still doing research and leading the Institute of Biomedicine in Caracas. He’s been credited as developer of a vaccine against leprosy, has made progresses in many other diseases, and has received many awards along his career. For the last 5 years he’s been focused in a therapeutic vaccine against cancer. The approach is simple: taking cells from the patient’s tumor, combining them with bacterial proteins, and reintroducing the cells (deactivated) in the patient’s body. The hope is that the immune system creates antibodies against the original tumor cells. He’s done experiments with animals, and even inoculated 20 terminal cancer patients. He hasn’t published any peer reviewed results yet, and has not proved any efficacy. But in summer 2010 he announced important progresses in his vaccine against cancer. Some media and bloggers exaggerated their claims. News spread that “Jacinto Convit has created a vaccine against breast and colon cancer”. As a consequence, during the last year hundreds of patients and familiars have been going to the hospital asking for the vaccine. The Institute of Biomedicine was forced to send a note clarifying that the vaccine is still under development. Today we point attention to a very good story in El Nacional by the science reporter Andrea Small. She balances respect for the  important work of the beloved Convit making very clear the vaccine’s important limitations. She explains the supposed mechanism of action, but highlights why it is still extremely far from a possible therapeutic application. We consider this story as a good example of how to praise local researchers while being honest about their results. Also, the situation in summer 2010 is a clear example of scientists not being careful enough with their claims, and how the irresponsible exaggeration of some reporters and bloggers leads to a misunderstanding in the general population.

The Spanish tracker knew about this situation last November when he met Andrea in a meeting of science journalists in Buenos Aires. I’ve tracked her work and discovered several good, critical notes on science policy and environmental issues. Most of them appear only in the print edition of El Nacional. She’s also published in SciDev on the implications of Venezuelan cuts in research funding. I again reached Andrea, by email, and asked several questions about science journalism in Venezuela. She says the El Nacional is the only newspaper that covers science regularly, that there is a lot of pseudoscience in the press, and that the daily agenda in Venezuela is absolutely marked by political and crime reports. She explains that universities and scientific institutions are doing efforts, but they have serious difficulties reaching the general public. And also that there is no single course on science journalism in the country.

Hoy descubrimos a una periodista científica combativa en Venezuela. La historia empieza en verano pasado cuando el carismático científico venezolano de 98 años Jacinto Convit, reconocido por desarrollar la vacuna de la lepra, anunció progresos importantes en sus investigaciones sobre una vacuna terapéutica contra el cáncer. Pasó lo que no debe pasar: los medios exageraron y transmitieron a la población el mensaje de que en Venezuela existía una vacuna contra el cáncer. Responsabilidad de los medios, pero también de los investigadores por no ser mucho más explícitos con el estado real de las investigaciones. La consecuencia fue obvia: centenares de personas se volcaron en esta esperanza de curación y fueron al hospital en busca de tratamiento. Lo explica muy bien la nota en la edición impresa de El Nacional de Andrea Small “Falta mucho para llegar a la meta”, una fantástica pieza que mereció a su autora ganar el premio de periodismo científico Arístedes Bastidas en Venezuela.

El mensaje oculto del texto de Andrea es que la terapia propuesta por el Dr Convit está todavía en una fase muy experimental, y falta un largísimo camino para quizás una aplicación terapéutica. De hecho, como ocurre muy a menudo en ciencia, lo más probable es que nunca ocurra. Éste no es un camino fácil. Andrea explica muy bien el funcionamiento de la vacuna terapéutica de Jacinto Convit: cuando a un paciente se le diagnostica cáncer, por medio de una biopsia se le extrae un gramo de células tumorales, éstas se combinan con una sustancia procedente de un bacilo, y se vuelven a introducir en el cuerpo. Las proteínas del bacilo generan una respuesta inmunológica, que puede atacar las células tumorales. La verdad…aunque el Dr. Convit haya visto que efectivamente el sistema inmunológico se activa y genera más anticuerpos, esto esta lejísimos de demostrar su eficacia, y sobre todo, seguridad. Dato importante: los datos ni siquiera están publicados en una revista científica revisada por pares. El artículo de Andrea está muy bien escrito, explicando el día a día de los investigadores, la reacción irracional de desesperación de muchos pacientes, y dejando entrever lo difícil que será el éxito. Podría haber sido más dura todavía. Ya se había mostrado escéptica en 2010 justo después del precipitado anuncio con el texto “Centros científicos del mundo buscan vacuna contra el cáncer” (Andrea Small), donde explicaba que mundialmente hay estudios de vacunas terapéuticas contra el cáncer más avanzadas que la de Convit, y que debía haber una respuesta oficial sobre el tema. Excelente labor de Andrea, que incluso busca opinión en experto en cáncer estadounidense.

Donde también fue crítica y mucho es en otro asunto de temática ambiental: la tala de 700 árboles del parque Vargas en Caracas de Caracas para construir viviendas. La nota fue respondida de manera vehemente por un ministro en su blog diciendo que era falso y que se trataba de un paseo, y estalló la guerra. En una siguiente nota Andrea explicaba que sí era un parque y la importante función que tenía, que otorgar los permisos Andrea explicaba que sí era un parque penal, y a los pocos días publicó una entrevista a un especialista en derecho ambiental diciendo que “El modelo de desarrollo de caracas es una fábrica de desastres ambientales”. Espíritu combativo importante, que supera las fronteras de su país. Hace un par de semanas Andrea Small publicó “Venezuela: déficit presupuestario amenaza investigación” en SciDev; una nota denunciando la preocupación de la comunidad científica venezolana por el estancamiento de las partidas presupuestarias dedicadas a i+D, a pesar de la gran inflación de el país. No sólo limita equipos y personal, sino incluso asistencia a congresos y publicación en revistas. Sin salir da la política científica, en El Nacional Andrea ha publicado sobre las aireadas quejas de científicos contra la ley de ciencia que restringe la libertad de investigación al superditarla al control gubernamental, y una interesantísima entrevista al autor del libro “Ciencia y Poder” sobre los conflictos entre ciencia y gobierno en la gestión de Hugo Chávez, que según el autor han provocado una reducción de la actividad científica. En pocos países de la región percibimos este periodismo crítico y documentado que muestra Andrea Small. Merece ser considerado.

Este tracker aprovechó la ocasión para hablar con Andrea y preguntarle por el periodismo de ciencia en Venezuela. A nivel de medios escritos, explica que el periódico de más tirada (Última Hora) tuvo una sección de ciencia pero desapareció hace un tiempo. Que El Nacional es el que publica ciencia de manera más regular, y que un aspecto a mejorar es la mezcla de informaciones pseudocientíficas que aparecen. No hay revistas con contenidos científicos, pero sí ejemplos interesantes de divulgación como el boletín USB noticias de la Universidad Simón Bolívar, que también cuenta con un proyecto audiovisual de entrevistas a profesores de la Universidad.

Un matiz importante es que  en Venezuela la agenda diaria está fuertemente marcada por política economía y sucesos, y esto limita muchísimo el espacio a temas como ciencia y ambiente. Andrea pide fe en la necesidad de estas noticias, apoyo a los periodistas de ciencia para que los espacios se mantengan cursos de posgrado en periodismo científico. La falta de formación especializada es también un problema. En la parte positiva, denota esfuerzos institucionales por promover la divulgación científica, y que recientemente se reactivó el Círculo de Periodismo Científico de Venezuela . Como reflexión final, Andrea explica que la población está convencida de que en su país no se hace ciencia de calidad, y eso sólo puede cambiar con una buena comunicación.

- Pere Estupinyà

Roger Harrabin, specializing in environmental news and issues, has been distinguishing himself for many years at the BBC. (He even has a statistical-sociological-media rule-of-thumb named after him, Harrabin’s Law.) He has visited both Niagara Falls in the US and Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. Right now, while on a sabbatical journalism fellowship in the US, he surfaces to write a stinging comparison of the schlock surrounding the US’s natural hydrological wonder with the near-pristine sights that greet one on hiking through a national park to reach the Zambezi’s greatest cataract. Other than a graceful and historic bridge, the latter looks about as it did 200 years ago.

At the first level, the point of this essay is right on. The US and Canada have provided fabulous views of Niagara from high rise hotel luxury rooms – but those vistas are seriously fouled by neon lights, other hotels, and additional layers of garish tourist facilities and their ads. Impoverished Zimbabwe, a darned near failed state, has managed to respects its falls’s listing as a World Heritage Site and held the impingement of modern society to a minimum.

He does temper his tantrum by noting that American and Canadian promoters began tatting up Niagara long before zoning bodies and traditions enacted controls over what one can build near natural wonders or within vulnerable landscapes and their wildlife habitats. Still, he asks, “Does Niagara really need to look like Las Vegas on the water?”

The UNESCO natural heritage rules and America’s (and Canada’s, I presume) reluctance to list Niagara permits Harrabin to make a good and focussed point. But his lens goes too wide with this:

It is to the shame of the US that impoverished Zimbabwe, an international pariah to many, is willing to protect its portion of the world’s natural heritage more lovingly than a nation which can afford such protection so much more.

  The point is that Niagara’s besmirchment is a historic anomaly. The US, starting with Yellowstone and on through the vision of Teddy Roosevelt to today, has pioneered the creation of large and well-guarded national parks. Today many are polluted by industrial emissions, hemmed by development and by natural resource extraction industries, sometimes besieged by hordes of visitors to the point of fraying their natural system, and underfunded by taxpayer’s money. Conservationists must remain vigilant. But respect for the parks remains strong. Overall the US continues by federal law and private philanthropy and support to expand and care for them (along with state and county parks) as well or better than most of the rest of the world. And Canada, far as I can tell, has a solid record as well.

- Charlie Petit